New Jersey Ratifies the 19th Amendment, February 9, 1920

Early in United States history New Jersey was a leader in suffrage, with both women and African Americans able to vote if they met residency and property requirements. Both groups lost the right to vote in 1807 when the state changed their voting eligibility to only white, male, tax-paying citizens. In 1867 Lucy Stone founded the New Jersey Woman Suffrage Association and the following year women petitioned the state legislature for suffrage. Women petitioned the legislature for the vote again in 1884 and were granted the ability to vote in school elections in 1887, but the New Jersey Supreme Court reversed that in 1894. Despite the work of New Jersey suffragists, women in the state did not receive the vote before the 19^th Amendment. In 1912 a new resolution for women’s suffrage and it passed both houses of two successive legislatures but was defeated in the public election in 1915. When Congress passed the 19^th Amendment, New Jersey ratified it on February 9, 1920.

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